A coalition of nine states has sided with the Bush administration in seeking
U.S. Supreme Court review of an Indian gaming dispute with implications
for tribes nationwide.

Led by California, the group takes aim at two circuit court rulings that
favored tribal interests. In an 11-page amicus brief filed last week,
the states say the decisions threaten regulation of the
$14 billion Indian gaming industry.

Unless the matter is resolved, the states warn that "creative minds"
could create
"highly sophisticated" electronic
devices that look like slot machines and play like
slot machines. "From the player's point of view," the brief
argues, "these so-called 'technologic aids' are indistinguishable
in any meaningful sense from any other slot machine along
the casino wall."

These devices upset the regulation of Indian gaming in several ways,
the states say. One example cited is that tribes could offer the machines
at casinos without having to negotiate a compact.

But even tribes with compacts are affected, the states say.
Electronic devices would allow tribes
to bypass restrictions that some compacts place on
slot machines. In California,
for example, each tribe is limited to 2,000 slot machines. At least two tribes
have installed electronic casino machines.

The final threat the states cite is their own pocketbooks.
Tribes could "avoid revenue sharing obligations" in existing
compacts by replacing slot machines with electronic devices
that states can't touch.

In California, where Indian casinos generate an estimated $4 billion
every year, compacts and revenue-sharing are hot topics.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) wants tribes to
share $500 million with the state. His gaming negotiator has
already met with several tribes.

In Connecticut, whose Democratic attorney general Richard
Blumenthal joined the brief, two tribes already share 25 percent of
their slot machine revenues. Last year,
they sent more than $400 million to the state.

Some of the other attorneys general that signed the
brief hail from states that refuse to negotiate gaming
compacts with tribes. Alabama, Nebraska and Texas are among this set.

Tribes in these three states are limited to bingo, pull-tabs and similar games.
But one tribe in Nebraska, the Santee Sioux, is facing penalties
for installing electronic machines. This dispute is the subject of
the 8th Circuit Court decision the states and the Bush
administration want the Supreme Court to review.

Rounding out the pack are Massachusetts, where no tribal
gaming facilities exist, and Nevada, Minnesota and South Dakota.
Taken together, the nine states are home to more than 150 tribes.

One state absent from the brief is Oklahoma. Two tribes there,
the Seneca-Cayuga and the Fort Sill Apache, along
with the Northern Arapaho of Wyoming,
are the subject of the 10th Circuit Court decision that is
also up for review.
Gov. Brad Henry (D) has just proposed a bill
legalize the "highly sophisticated" machines the nine states
speak of in their brief.

The three tribes, along with an casino machine company, submitted their own brief last week.
They urged the Supreme Court justices not to accept the appeal, arguing
that it was moot because the pull-tab machine in question is no longer
manufactured. But they also said the two decisions are of
"doubtful significance."